Barrett Brooks

For so long, we’ve thought of managers being the people who simply keep track of the tasks to be done. They sit over your shoulder, making sure you’re getting the tasks done fast enough and with just enough quality. There’s a difference between a leader and a manager, though they’re certainly not exclusive. A leader […]

Elon Musk is the real-life Tony Stark. He runs or is actively involved in three businesses: Tesla – Transforming the automobile industry by creating well-designed, attractive electric vehicles and the technology to power them (all while open-sourcing their patents) SpaceX – Transforming the space travel, including the possibility of colonizing Mars Solar City – Transforming […]

Every person who works has a job to be done, day in and day out (or, they should have a job to do, but we won’t get into organizational inefficiencies today). Similarly, every team has a job to be done. The difference between teams and individuals is mostly a matter of resources. A team clearly […]

The desire to change often comes from the desire for something to stop. We experience something that makes us realize we’re against that thing. We want to quit the job we hate because we’re against the mission and culture and management style. We want to stop eating poorly because we’re against feeling crappy and being […]

A problem worth solving + The skills to solve it + Habits for execution + A community of support = Meaningful work Click to tweet this post.

Your career matters. It is perhaps the most powerful way you can make an impact in the world, aside from your family. One of the best ways to use your career for good is to find a problem worth solving and then go hard in the paint (that’s a basketball reference). But, of course, not […]

A great manager knows how to set a two-factor north star her team can believe in. Then she set a target, or a specific number to shoot for this year, or this quarter, or this month. An average manager would stop at that: set a target and hope the team meets the goal. When things […]

Every business, every team, every leader, and every individual contributor needs a north star. A north star guides the way. It’s a way to evaluate all of your efforts and understand whether you’re really fulfilling your mission. My north star here is daily publishing because it means I put work into the world everyday that […]

Capitalism is built on ROI, or return on investment. Corporations exist to maximize value to shareholders. Even small businesses have to produce ROI for the owners in order to make sense. This whole system started from a place where the best way to maximize shareholder value, in the very beginning, was to create value for […]

I believe sustainable energy production and electric vehicles are two of the most important frontiers of the next 25 years (and probably beyond). The more I learn about Elon Musk and his companies, the more I believe he might just be the man to lead us into a new historical era in the same way […]